Disclaimer: I do not own any part of Final Fantasy.
A/N: This will be quite short, it's RikkuxGippal cantered, with minimal or no OC involvement.
Moving on From You
"Just because you love someone doesn't mean you have to be involved with them. Love is not a bandage to cover wounds."
Hugh Elliott
Rikku
It happened a long time ago now. I don't really remember when. It was just there…somehow. We'd been friends for, well, forever. I think we met when we were five, or so. I have these hazy memories of us playing in the sand, our mothers looking on and laughing.
At school we stuck together like glue, neither of us wanted to be separated, and so they let us. We learned about everything together, and that was how we both found our mutual passion: machina. Our fathers were delighted when they discovered how much we both loved machines, and were glad to show us anything we wanted. And boy! Was that a lot!
Things stayed the same for years, people used to say, 'There go Rikku and Gippal again. You just can't seem to find one without the other.'
When your parents died, and your eye was injured, you came to stay with us, and we were closer than ever. I would wake up in the night to hear you crying, consumed with grief over the loss of your family, and I would hold you until you went to sleep again. We never spoke of it the next morning, you would simply smile and we'd go on as if nothing had happened.
I'm not sure when things changed.
I guess it was as we both got older; you started to notice things around you more. Namely, you began to notice girls. And hoo boy! They sure noticed you too. It was a gradual thing, but slowly, you pulled away from me, bit by bit, inch by inch, until we barely spoke more than a 'hello' over the breakfast table.
Of course, I didn't take all this lying down. You were my best friend, and I wasn't going to give that up without a fight! So I confronted you, several times, and you looked at me like I was insane.
"Sheesh, Rikku! Chill out would you?" I remember you saying, the day before you left for the crusaders. You were standing there; half dressed, eying me like I was a wendigo on the rampage.
"What do you mean? I only want to know why you've been avoiding me!" I retorted, genuinely annoyed that you seemed to be brushing me aside like the last ten years hadn't happened.
"See, the thing is, people move on, and –" You were cut off by the sound of some disgustingly saccharine female voice, echoing through the doorway of the room whose door I had practically beat down just trying to get you to answer it.
"Oh, no one. Just Cid's girl, you know?" You replied, facing away from me. At the time, I was furious that you would just turn your back on me like that. But now, I'm glad. Because it meant you didn't see my face when you dismissed me so offhandedly to whatever bimbo you had talked into your bed. By the time you'd sufficiently mollified her; I had my expression under control, and was confident the sharp pain which had knifed its way into my stomach was not showing on my face.
I smiled, not too much, just enough to show sheepish embarrassment. You fell for it, you stupid bastard.
"I'm sorry Gippal, I didn't realise you were busy. You're right, I'm overreacting. I just heard you are leaving soon, and I was worried, you know?" You were frowning, but nodded anyway. I could see relief in your expression, and I hated you for it.
"Yeah, I understand. I'm sorry we haven't spent that much time together lately, but…" Your voice trailed off, and you tossed me your most charming smile, perfectly tuned to evoke the most endearing of feelings in the one you inflicted it on. You were all boyish innocence but with a hint of mischief in those green, green eyes. It didn't work on me then, and it never had before. I knew who you were, underneath all that, or at least, I thought I did.
"Well, I don't reckon I'll see you before you go, so goodbye and good luck. Maybe we can catch up when this is all over?" I said, though it was obvious from my tone that I meant no such thing. You frowned again, but shook my offered hand. I turned away, without looking back, silently cursing you in my head.
That was the day, when I stopped being Rikku, your best friend.
That was the day I became 'just Cid's girl, you know?' And I hated it, hated you.
That was also the day I realised I was in love with you, and that it was too late.
I agreed to go on a salvage mission with my Dad and Brother. They were both surprised when I said yes, usually I avoided those things like the plague, but I wanted to get away, far away, from Home and everything that reminded me of you.
At first, it was a bloody nightmare, I don't know if you're aware, but salvage missions can be extremely tedious and repetitive. At least when you're looking for something worth salvaging that is.
But, then it happened – we found the big prize. Cid had been trying to get hold of this airship since he first unearthed the ancient documents speaking of it. It had become an obsession for him, and even while on other missions, he was always thinking about it. I don't know what lead us to the ruins of Baaj Temple that night, but there we were, and there it was.
Of course, that mission was distracting in more ways than one – as it was the first time I ever met Tidus. Not that I knew his name at the time. He reminded me of you at first, with that twinkle in his eyes. But he was different. A lot of what people see in the surface of you is engineered. It's done on purpose, for effect. I know it's what made you so successful with women, and I also assume it is what has made you a successful leader and business man.
Tidus isn't like that though, with him its all natural. His charisma is genuine, and just as much a part of him as his terrible sense of humour. Believe me, he tells really bad jokes. So I liked him, a lot, he seemed to be everything you were and everything you're not at the same time. And, even better, he noticed me.
Not as Cid's daughter, or Aniki's little sister, or that girl who's always with Gippal – but me. Rikku. He noticed me as a girl. I caught him looking a few times and was too startled to object. No one had looked at me that way before, and it was a huge novelty.
I didn't realise it at the time, but that meeting with Him, started something for me. Something more amazing than I could ever had imagined. I met my cousin, made new friends, and for a long time, completely forgot about you. I mean, who needed you? I had just helped the High Summoner defeat Sin once and for all. I admit to being rather pleased that I had done what you could not. After all, that's what you told everyone was your reason for leaving Home – to defeat Sin. And here was me, 'just Cid's girl' and I'll actually gone and bloody well done it.
Where were you then, I wondered?
After that, I went everywhere. Travelled all over, visiting with Yuna, working with Brother to fix up the airship he and Buddy had found buried under the ice. That was a long job.
And then Kimarhi came – he had found a sphere on Mount Gagazet, and it showed Him. Tidus. Who we all watched vanish after that terrible battle. He was on that sphere. Or someone who looked very like him. I knew then I had to take it to Yuna.
When we began our sphere hunting, I somehow knew I would be seeing you again. And I don't mean that in a romantic, sentimental way. By this stage, I had buried my feeling for you so deep; I had almost forgotten they existed. It was probably wrong of me, but all I felt now was contempt.
I understood; understand even, that people grow apart as they get older, that it is an inevitable part of life. But, I don't know. Somehow, it didn't feel like we had grown apart. It felt more like a rejection, and it stung.
I wasn't wrong either. It did lead me back to you, and as I stood there, looking at everything you had accomplished in such a short time, without me, something in me snapped. A tiny flame of hope, that I didn't even realise I had been harbouring, winked out.
Oh I didn't let it show, as usual. I just smiled and laughed, and when you came walking past, without even looking at me, but making sure you gave Yuna the eye, I gave up completely. You calling me Cid's girl and flirting outrageously with Yuna was all the evidence I needed. You had moved on from me, and now I had to move on from you. Properly this time.
So I did what I had always done when I was unhappy – I threw myself into my work with a reckless abandon – and what do you know? It paid off! Again, me and my friends did what you weren't able to do – save Spira. In the end, it was me Yunie and Paine, and we socked that tin can a good'un.
Now, it's all over. I haven't seen you since the victory party, and only exchanged five words with you then anyway. I surprise myself sometimes, how well I can hide things from people. Because of the way I appear – happy-go-lucky and carefree – they assume I'm frivolous, like I'm still a child underneath and should be treated as such. Yuna and Paine, though they depend on me in battle, rarely talk to me of anything important if it's unrelated to our missions. I realised that, for my whole life, I've been jumping on board with other people's missions, other people's goals.
Cid, Brother, Yuna, even Paine. But enough now. The Gullwings are disbanding. Yuna is leaving to marry Tidus, Paine is going to Bevelle for reasons she 'will not disclose', and us Al-Bhed? Well, we're going Home. To the ruins that is, to start again. We have always rebuilt, and Cid feels we've left it long enough. Rin says the Al-Bhed no longer need Home, but I disagree.
This Al-Bhed needs Home, if only to hide in it from the rest of the world, and from you.
So, despite my resolve to find my own path, I am at Home, helping my Dad. And things actually aren't that bad. I've found the bickering somewhat reassuring, and though while none of them take me seriously, neither do they start pressing me to talk about my feelings if I'm quiet for more than five minutes.
Things have been relatively peaceful for the last six months or so, and tomorrow, is my eighteenth birthday. I was actually looking forward to it, until Cid told me he'd invited you and all your Faction members along for the ride. The usual protests of 'it's my party and I'll invite who I want to' fell on deaf ears. It seems I have no say in the matter.
I don't want to see you. I don't actually want to see anyone. But apparently my wishes don't come into it.
So, now I have a choice.
I can stay and spend the day talking to people who will coo at me and pet me on the head like some kind of playful puppy, running roughshod over my wishes and desires, or, I could run away. Far away.
I haven't decided yet.
